The name of this paper's protagonist appears in various forms in the documents on which it is based: Hippolito, Hyppolito, Hypolito, Hipólito. I have chosen this last version to be used throughout; however, when quoting a document verbatim, I shall use the version used in that document.

 

The lawyer

            The Brazilian Hipólito José da Costa Pereira Furtado de Mendonça was born on 25 March 1774, in Colonia do Sacramento, a town on the borderland between the Spanish and the Portuguese colonies in South America, now belonging to Uruguay. [1]  He was the son of Félix da Costa, an officer in the Portuguese army, and Ana Josefa Pereira. Soon after his birth, following the signature of the Treaty of Santo Ildefonso that finally established the border, the Da Costa family moved to the Brazilian town of Rio Grande do San Pedro.

            The surname Furtado de Mendonça is clearly a translation of the Spanish Hurtado de Mendoza, a well-known surname [2] confirming the Spanish origin of the family, belonging to the Jewish Sephardic community first exiled to Portugal, and then to Holland, the West Indies and finally England, where the Da Costas were among the leaders of the Sephardic congregation in London.  A score of Da Costas or Mendes da Costa lived there at the time of the Grand Lodge's foundation, working in the diamond trade. [3]  There are several Mendes da Costas in the Masonic lists. [4]

            Hipólito received his primary schooling in Porto Alegre, where he came under the tutorship of his uncle Pedro Pereira Fernández de Mesquita, who prepared him for the entrance examinations to the university.

            On 29 October 1792, at the age of 18, he enrolled in the Faculty of Mathematics at the University of Coimbra, Portugal, and a month later he also entered the Faculty of Philosophy. On 18 October of the following year he entered the Faculty of Law, graduating on 5 June 1798, being 24 years old. [5]  In Coimbra, Hipólito was influenced by the liberal reforms introduced into university studies by the Marquis of Pombal. A year earlier his family was awarded a coat-of-arms by King John VI. [6]

            Three months after graduation, Da Costa was sent on a semi-secret mission to the United States of America by the Portuguese Minister of the Navy and Commerce, Rodrigo de Souza Coutinho, Count of Linhares, to study in the new Republic various aspects of agriculture and industry that might be of use to the Portuguese kingdom. Hipólito sailed to Philadelphia, then the Capital of the United States, on 16 October 1798, arriving at the City of Brotherly Love on 13 December, after 59 days of travel. He remained in the United States for two years. Apart from observing the methods used for the extraction and processing of minerals, the cultivation of various plants, such as tobacco and cotton, the building of wooden bridges, the production of silk and other aspects of the economy, Da Costa wanted to get from Mexico the Cochineal insects and plants, intending to introduce them in Portugal. This insect (Dactylopius coccus) lives on Nopal cacti and it produces a valuable dyestuff, the famous brilliant red carmine. Other species produce the equally valuable shellac. The insects were obtained, but they died on the long voyage to Europe.

            Da Costa moved among the highest circles of American society. He met President Adams and was impressed by the President's simplicity, so different from the stiff court protocol. He also met Thomas Jefferson, the Secretary of State Timothy Pickering and Oliver Walcott, who succeeded Alexander Hamilton as Secretary of the Treasury, [7] and also made contact with French émigrés, who had escaped from the Terror and later, from Napoleon.

            Hipólito wrote monographs and lengthy reports on all his observations, delivered personally to the Portuguese Minister. He did not remain in Philadelphia, but made extensive trips in the United States and Canada. Some of his reports remained forgotten in dusty archives, and were published only in 1955 by the Brazilian Academy of Letters under the title Diary of my Voyage to Philadelphia – 1798-1799.

            Soon after his return to Portugal in 1800, he was appointed as literary director of the Impreçao Régia (Royal Printers); Da Costa had the authority to decide what would be published, he revised the texts and published articles.

            On April of 1802, the Minister of the Navy and Commerce again sent him abroad on a mission, this time to England, in order to purchase machinery for the press and books for the Royal Library. This appears to be the source of his later enthusiasm for journalism. He also used the opportunity to visit Grand Lodge, as described in the next section of this paper.

            Upon his return to Portugal the next year, however, he was imprisoned by the Inquisition, accused of being a Mason and of disseminating Masonic ideas in Portugal. He remained incarcerated almost three years. In the end, he managed to escape disguised as the servant of another Mason, Felippe Ferreira, crossing Spain into Gibraltar and finally arriving in England in 1805, where he settled until his death in 1823. [8]

            In 1811 Da Costa published a relation of his experiences with the Inquisition,  in two volumes bearing a long title, as customary at the time: Narrative of the Persecution of Hippolyto da Costa Pereira Furtado de Mendonça, a native of Colonia-de-Sacramento, on the River La Plata; imprisoned and tried in Lisbon, by the Inquisition, for the pretended crime of Free-Masonry, to which are added The By-Laws of the Inquisition of Lisbon, both Ancient and Modern (never before published), Taken from the Originals in one of the Royal Libraries in London.  

            One of his comments was: "Nothing irritates more the inquisitors, than a man who reasons".

            Da Costa married an Englishwoman, Mary Ann Troughton. They had two daughters, Augusta Carolina and Anne Shirley, and one son, Augustus Frederick (born on 3 May 1821), Captain in the Royal Engineers Regiment, who was killed by Chinese pirates in Hong Kong in 1849, without leaving descendants. The daughters, on the other hand, married and left numerous descendants. [9]

 

The Mason

            It is probable that Da Costa was initiated in Philadelphia, in Lodge George Washington N° 59 on 2 March 1799, at the age of 25.  [10] Not long after, he requested a Demit (official release from the lodge), probably contemplating his return to Portugal and fearing – with good reason, at it turns out - the persecution of Masons instigated by the Catholic Church. Unfortunately, the archives of the lodge concerning 1799 were lost in a fire in 1819.

            After returning to Portugal from his mission in the United States, Hipólito contacted Portuguese masons, like the Worshipful Master of Lodge Concórdia, José Joaquim Monteiro de Carvalho e Oliveira, who requested his assistance in opposing the persecutions of Pina Manique, which will be explained below. [11]

            While in London on official business, Da Costa attended the Premier Grand Lodge on 12 May, 1802. He was received as the plenipotentiary representative of four Portuguese lodges that wanted to receive from the Grand Lodge of England "regular authority to practice the rites of the Order under the English banner and protection". [12] This is definite proof that he was a regular Mason at the time, since otherwise the Grand Lodge would have refused all contact with him. Some writers claim that the Portuguese wanted to establish a Grand Lodge of Lusitania to work in amity with the British one, but they provide no supporting evidence for this claim.[13] After deliberation, the Grand Lodge decided to encourage the Portuguese Brethren, who might enroll their names in its records, and conform to the constitutions of the Order, but on condition that a list of their names be sent to England as well as a recommendation from their local government officials before their request could be approved. [14]

            Rumors of his Masonic activities in London reached Portugal. Although forewarned that he risked arrest if he returned, Da Costa paid no heed and went back to Lisbon at the end of June; the warnings were justified, as he was promptly arrested by José Anastácio Lopes Cardoso, Court Crimes Corregidor [15] following the instructions of the infamous Chief of Police Diogo Ignacio de Pina Manique. [16] The country was ruled at the time by Queen Maria I "the Mad" who was a fanatic persecutor of Masons and conducted a veritable witch-hunt against them. [17] 

            Da Costa spent six months in the Limoeiro jail, and was then turned over to the Inquisition, remaining in its prison for almost three years: "in a small 8 by 12 feet room, furnished with a straw mattress, a jug and a glass, replaced every 8 days when I went to Mass", he wrote. [18] He finally escaped with the help of the Masons, who assisted him to stay in hiding until he could make his way to freedom disguised as a servant of Brother Fillipe Ferreira de Araújo Castro, going first to Spain, then Gibraltar and finally England.

            Once in London, Hipólito joined the Lodge of the Nine Muses (now No. 235) in 1807 and the Lodge of Antiquity (now No. 2) in 1808. In this last lodge he became Deputy Master in 1812 and 1813, serving under the Duke of Sussex, sixth son of King George III. He became a personal friend of the Duke and also of the Duke of Leinster. Sussex was a witness to his marriage in 1817. [19]  He is also registered as one of the founders of Lusitania Lodge 184 in 1812  [20]  and of Royal Inverness Lodge in 1814. [21]

            Da Costa joined the small inner circle of assistants to the Duke of Sussex when this became the Grand Master. [22]  In 1813 he was appointed by the Duke as Provincial Grand Master for Rutland, although no lodges could be found in his province. Most writers claim that the Province of Leister and Rutland was split in order to create the honorary post for Hipólito. However, Professor Aubrey Newman, in his inaugural paper as Master of Quatuor Coronati Lodge N° 2076, [23] points out that Da Costa was only the fourth to be appointed to that sinecure; he was preceded by Robert Boyle Walsingham (1780), Thomas Boothby (1789) and Richard Barker (1798), so Da Costa's appointment followed a well-trodden path.

            There is a small oil portrait of him in the Grand Lodge of England's Museum, showing Da Costa wearing the regalia of his office, which he kept until his death.  Four other portraits of Da Costa are known, of which one that belonged to the Duke of Sussex, was eventually donated to the Brazilian Government and is now displayed in the Itamaraty Palace in Brasília, head office of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. [24]

            After the two Grand Lodges became joined in 1813 to form the United Grand Lodge of England and the Duke of Sussex became its first Grand Master, [25] he appointed Da Costa as a member of the Lodge of Reconciliation in 1814. According to John M. Hamill, he played an active role in the work of the lodge devising the uniform rituals to be used by lodges in the United Grand Lodge.  He was also a member of the Lodge of Promulgation that prepared the ground for the union of the two Grand Lodges.

            His activity in Grand Lodge was not restricted to all this. He was also Chairman of the Finances Committee from 1813 until his death in 1823. [26]

            Da Costa was active in the Royal Arch, presumably in a lodge under the Antients. "He was re-obligated in the Chapter of St. James (now N° 2) under the Original Grand and Royal Arch Chapter. When the Duke of Sussex was to be installed as First Grand Principal, in 1810, Da Costa was one of those appointed to examine him in the Royal Arch. In the original Grand Chapter he held the appointments of Assistant Grand Sojourner in 1810, Grand Scribe N in 1811 and 1812, and Grand Recorder for Foreign Correspondence from 1812. He was given the rank of Past Grand Scribe E and was accorded special responsibility for Foreign Correspondence on the formation of Supreme Grand Chapter in 1817".  [27]

            In 1819 the Supreme Council of France conferred the 33rd Degree on him and on the Duke of Sussex. A manuscript of the patent appears in Oxford's The Origin and Progress of the Supreme Council 33°… for England, (1933).  According to A. C. F. Jackson (see the Bibliography), the Duke of Sussex, together with the Duke of Leinster and Da Costa, received the 33° Degree with full ceremony but then took no action to establish a Supreme Council for Great Britain, as the French expected.

            He was also an Officer of the Grand Conclave of Knights Templar (under the Duke of Sussex) and a Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Red Cross of Palestine. These were Masonic bodies that required a belief in the Trinity, and he was married and buried according to the rites of the Church of England, all of which demonstrate that Da Costa was at the time a professed Christian. However, his Sephardic origin cannot be in dispute. In fact, several Sephardic Jews with the name Joseph da Costa can easily be found doing a simple search in the Internet. For example, a Joseph da Costa, brother of the more famous Uriel da Costa, lived in Amsterdam in the middle of the 17th century. [28] Another Joseph da Costa was part of a group of 27 Jews who were among the first to arrive at the Dutch settlement of New Amsterdam (now New York) in 1654. 

            It is said that Hipólito owned a copy of Preston's Lectures that may be the oldest extant copy, presently held by the Library of the United Grand Lodge.  [29]

            During his London sojourn, Da Costa formed close relations with personalities such as William Preston and Francisco Miranda. He caused the initiation in 1812 of the Brazilian Domingos José Martins, who worked in London, and later became the head of the Pernambuco Revolution of 1817.

 

The journalist

            In June of 1808 Da Costa started publishing in London the Correio Brasiliense ou Armazém Literário, this being the first Brazilian newspaper, anteceding by three months the Gazeta do Rio de Janeiro that began appearing on September 10 of the same year.

            From its beginning, the Correio Brasiliense appeared every 1st of the month. It held an irregular number of pages, from 72 to 140, and had the aspect of a small book in 8°: 20 cm x 13 cm. The Correio Brasiliense became the tribune for liberal analysis and criticism of the political situation in Portugal and Brazil. The journal strongly supported changes in the South American country, promoting the construction of a network of roads, the use of raw materials for manufactures that would expand the local market, the abolishment of slavery and the adoption of an immigration policy that would give preference to artisans and technicians over unqualified laborers. Da Costa attacked the rampant corruption in the bureaucracies of Brazil and Portugal. He corresponded with Brazilian reformers and leaders of the independence movement, like José Bonifacio. However, he did not favor instituting a republican form of government, considering that Brazil was not ready for such revolutionary move. His paper was banned by the Portuguese authorities, but found its way into Brazil (and even Portugal) despite all efforts to stop it.

            A point on which no agreement has been reached by the historians is the source of financing for the Correio Brasiliense. Some claim that the Portuguese government offered to buy 500 copies of the paper, on condition that "uncomfortable" subjects were not published, but this suggestion is dismissed by Chaparro [30] who points out the fact that the Portuguese Ambassador, the Earl of Funchal, launched a competing journal in Portuguese totally financed by the government. Chaparro considers that the most plausible explanation is that Prince John (later king, who was never attacked personally by Da Costa) gave financial support indirectly, through the intermediary of Heliodoro Jacinto de Araújo de Carneiros Alvelos and others. John wanted to adopt liberal measures opposed by his ministers, and he found it convenient to publicize these liberal views in the London organ.

            A total of 175 issues (29 volumes) were printed, reaching an average  circulation of 1000 copies, until 1822, when the journalist considered that, having Brazil achieved its independence (in that same year) his mission had been accomplished.

            In issue number 58 of his journal (1813), Hipólito José da Costa indicated the place where Brasilia, the present Capital of Brazil, would be built: "This central point between parallels 15 and 20 is at the head of the famous San Francisco river. In the vicinity are sources of mighty rivers that flow to the north, the south, the north-east and the south-east, several ranges to raise cattle and rich mines of plentiful metals. It can be compared with the description we have of the earthly Paradise". [31] Brasilia was in fact built in the central plateau by President Juscelino Kubitschek de Oliveira, and was officially inaugurated in 1960.

            Da Costa played a leading role in persuading the British government to recognize the independence of Brazil in 1823.

            Hipólito Da Costa died on 11 September 1823 in his home, at 7, Lower Philimore Place, Kensington, London, soon after ending publication of his journal and before he could receive the letters-patent as Consul General in London and Counselor of the Legation of the Brazilian Empire. He was buried in the church of St. Mary the Virgin in the small town of Hurley, near Maidenhead. On the wall near the tomb is a memorial plaque ordered by the Duke of Sussex, and above it is the Da Costa's coat of arms. At the initiative of Brazilian journalistic personalities and diplomats his remains were exhumed and transported to Brazil, where he was buried with full ceremony in the gardens of the National Press Museum in Brasilia, on 24 April 2001. [32]

            His love and devotion for his land of birth was not forgotten. His name appears among the first Officers of the Imperial Order of the Cruzeiro, instituted after the independence of Brazil. [33]  Emperor Pedro I of Brazil granted a monthly pension of 100 pounds for Mary Ann, widow of Hipólito. The Brazilian Academy of Letters designated one of its forty chairs (Chair 17) in his name, and in 1999 the Grand Orient of Brazil celebrated the "Hipólito da Costa Year", commemorating the 200th anniversary of his initiation in Lodge George Washington 59 of the Grand Lodge of Pennsylvania. [34]

            Furthermore, in 1974 Brazil issued a stamp commemorating the 200th anniversary of his birth, and the Brazilian Postal Company ECT produced an appropriate envelope bearing his portrait.

            Many of his writings originally in English were later translated into Portuguese. A list of his publications is appended to this paper.

 

The Dionysian Artificers

            This small book, in fact little more than a pamphlet, contains only 47 pages of text, plus numerous footnotes.

            Da Costa starts with a history of the ancient mysteries relating them to the worship of the sun. In Greece, the ceremonies were held in Appollonia, a city dedicated to the god Apollo. There, the author finds an astronomical explanation for the fact that the mysteries were celebrated on three consecutive days, and elsewhere lasted fifteen days. He then connects these numbers with the Pythagorean symbols and secrets that "were borrowed from those of Orphic or Eleusian rites, and they consisted in the study of the sciences and useful arts, united with theology and ethics, and they were communicated in cyphers and symbols."

            The use of letters representing numbers brings the author to the cabbalistic names and to the symbolism of numbers, focusing on the number three "to which so many mystical and moral allusions were made", which had reference "to the three celestial circles, two of which the sun touches, passing over the third in its annual course." The reference here is, of course, to the two equinoxes and the celestial equator.

            Da Costa describes the mysteries of Eleusis which, he claims, were the same as those of Dionysius or Bacchus.  The aspirant was admitted as a candidate only after reaching a certain age. Here, and in the following description of the ceremonies, Da Costa makes a clear parallel with Masonic practices, in particular those of the French lodges.  "At the ceremony of admission into these mysteries, the candidate was first shown into a dark room, called the mystical chapel. There certain questions were put to him" This refers explicitly to the Chamber of Reflection in French lodges, where the candidate must put in writing the answers to four questions that constitute his Masonic Testament.

            "When introduced, he [the candidate] was brought forward, from between two pillars or stones; he was rewarded by the vision of a multitude of extraordinary lights…the person opposite [him] was called the Revealer of Sacred Things…at a certain distance stood the torch-bearer, who represented the sun, and beside the altar was a third person, who represented the moon"  The two columns, the vision of light, the two officiants representing the sun and the moon – the two Wardens in the Masonic lodge while the third one stands for the Master, all these have parallels in the Masonic initiation.

            Further down, the writer points out that the mysteries were not communicated all at once, but gradually, in three different parts, in the third of them the candidate was made symbolically to approach death and then return to life. Again, the similarity with Masonic ceremonies is obvious. Da Costa, in an endnote, quotes Proclus (Theol. Plat. Lib. IV, p. 220): "The perfective part precedes initiation, and initiation precedes inspection". The three-stage initiatory process in the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite follows a similar sequence, since the first ceremony, called the Initiation, is actually a sequence of symbolic purifications by the four elements – earth, air, water and fire, the second (to Fellow-Craft) is a transitional stage, known as "rise in wages", and the third, the Rising or Exaltation, represents the symbolic death-resurrection of the candidate.

            Having come to the death-resurrection myth, Da Costa enters into a discussion of the various forms which the myth took in antiquity, mentioning Adonis, Thamuz, Horus, Mithra, etc. He connects these ceremonies with the apparent movement of the sun during its annual cycle and the point where the king of heaven appears close to death (the winter solstice) and its rebirth, celebrated with wild expressions of joy. The sun itself, he writes, "was chosen as a symbol of the Deity, though afterwards taken by the vulgar as a Deity". In a following note Da Costa quotes several writers from antiquity to support this assessment.

            Coming to a description of the mysteries, he stresses that they represented the descent of the soul into the body. The soul is purified from the coarseness of material nature by the exercise of the virtues.

            The mysteries had to be concealed from the common people, because they would be incapable of understanding them.

            (This is also the main reason for the discreet nature of Freemasonry, mistakenly regarded as a penchant for secrecy).

            However, Da Costa adds a caveat, that the ignorance of the teachers themselves caused the mysteries to be preserved only in their form, while the essence was lost. Almost 200 years ago, this Brazilian writer predicted in veiled form the fate of many Grand Lodges of our present day.

            The mysteries of the sun represented the triumph of the spirit over matter; an ark was carried in procession, said to contain the body of Osiris, but Da Costa believes that it contained spheres instead, representing the solar system.

            The writer then advances a theory on the transmission of these mysteries to other nations, and the role played by Ionians who specialized in building. They formed a society "now called the Dionysian Artificers", who performed the Dionysian festivities in Greece, and later in Syria, Persia and India, and from this period dates the connection of the symbols of Astronomy with those of the art of building.

            Taking his cue from the book of Kings, Da Costa considers that the Giblim who came to assist King Solomon in building the Jerusalem Temple were in fact those Dionysian Artificers who had settled in Gabbel or Byblos, where a temple to Apollo was erected and the Eleusian or Dionysian mysteries were celebrated. [35] Also, Josephus says that the Grecian style of architecture was the one used at the temple of Jerusalem (Antiquities, Book VIII, c. 5). 

            This would explain the introduction of the ceremonies of Thamuz into Judea, and Solomon himself was not free from the influence of these rites. Some years later, the prophet Ezekiel would complain of the Israelite women weeping for Thamuz (Ezekiel 8:14). Thamuz, in Hebrew tau-mem-vau-zayin, is supposed to be another name for Adonis, and the Hebrew word appears to be related to the word Kamuz, an adjective meaning "hidden, secret".

            When introducing these mysteries to the Hebrew, the Dionysian Artificers would make them more palatable to the religious Jews by explaining that the sun, the original symbol of the mysteries, represented in fact God's bountiful goodness to man, and the apparent movement of the sun served as a memento of mortality and rebirth. However, to avoid a charge of idolatry in these ceremonies and symbols, "another personage must have been substituted for Adonis or Osiris, and as a symbolic death and resurrection was essential, in the allegory of the system, the history of the death of another individual must have been substituted".  [36]

            Here, without saying so explicitly, the writer explains the introduction of the Hiramic legend, where Hiram the Widow's Son is the substitute hero.

            Da Costa now turns to the Jerusalem Temple which, in his words, represented the universe, "to symbolize that Jehovah was no local God, but the only God, Lord of the universe" (p. 39).

            The author now connects the annual cycle of nature with the symbol of the snake biting its tail, the Ouroboros, representing eternity, but also an emblem of the year ending and beginning at once.

            Finally, Da Costa brings up the Essenians, connecting them to the Assideans or Cassideans whose business was to repair the temple. The writer, whose work antedates by over a century the discovery of the Dead Sea scrolls with their wealth of information about the inhabitants of Qumran, who were probably Essenians, does mention some of their practices, as recorded by Philo. The new information provided by the Dead Sea documents discloses some tantalizing parallels between theirs and Masonic practices. [37]  Although it would be far-fetched to assume a direct connection between Essenians and Masons, the existing similarities point to a possible hidden tradition transmitted through the centuries by a succession of esoteric societies.  

 

Epilogue

            Elmano Cardim, Editor of the Jornal do Commercio of Rio de Janeiro and member of the Brazilian Academy of Letter, had this to say at a ceremony on 30 April 1942, to baptize an aircraft with the name of Hipólito da Costa:

            "He was an intransigent liberal, but without the doctrinal sectarianism that claims that public salvation is only possible with preconceived formulas. He opposed a republic for Brazil, because, like Evaristo de Veiga, he had a clear vision that such a form of government was premature. 'The people that wants to be free and happy', he wrote in January of 1820 in the Correio Brasiliense, 'must ensure that liberty and that happiness it wants with its own virtue, because if it expects the help of other nations to enjoy these benefits, it will slave, will be unhappy… a people without morals, if it has no freedom, will never attain it, and if it has it, will certainly lose it." [38]

            We find here the echoes of those principles that inspired all Masons who fought for the liberation of their homeland.

 

 

Bibliography:

 

Almeida de Carvalho, William, "Hipólito da Costa", Engenho e Arte, 8/2001.

Alves da Silva, Joao, "No Tempo de Hipólito da Costa, A Trolha, Londrina (Brazil), April 2006.

Castellani, José, Os Maçons que Fizeram a Historia do Brazil, ed. Gazeta Maçonica, San Paulo 1991.

Castellani, José, Os Maçons na Independencia do Brasil, ed. Trolha, Londrina 1993.

Castellani, José, "O Patriarca da Impresa Brasileira e os Primórdios da Maçonaria Portuguesa", Boletim Oficial do Grande Oriente de Sao Paulo, N° 2244, 20 July 1995.

Castro, Therezinha de, Hipólito da Costa – Idéias e Ideais, Bibliex, Rio de Janeiro 1965.

Chaparro, Manoel Carlos, "Hipólito da Costa na corte de Dom João" in Sotaques d'aquém e d'além mar, Jortejo Edições, http://www.igutenberg.org/biblio21.html.

Costa, Hipólito José da, Narrativa da Perseguiçao, UFRS, Porto Alegre 1974.

Costella, Antonio F., "Os Biógrafos de Hipólito da Costa", in Almanaque Hipólito, Observatorio da Imprensa http://observatorio.ultimosegundo.ig.com.br/artigos/alm100620031.htm

Costella, Antonio F., "Cronología pesooal do jornalista", in Almanaque Hipólito, Observatorio da Imprensa

            http://observatorio.ultimosegundo.ig.com.br/artigos/alm030620032.htm

Da Costa, Hipólito, Sketch for the History of the Dionysian Artificers – A Fragment, London, 1820. http://sacred-texts.com/cla/dart/index.htm.

Dawson, P. J., Commentary on the paper by Shaftesley, ibid. p. 53.

De Oliveira, Jader, "De Volta ao Brasil", Correio Braziliense, 9 April 2001, http://www2.correioweb.com.br/cw/2001-04-09/print.htm.

Diaz de Souza Filho, Joao, "Patriarca da Imprensa Brasileira", Cruzeiro do Sul, 7 April 2006,  http://www.jcsol.com.br/2006/03/27/27A204.php

Dourado, Mecenas, Hipólito José da Costa e O Correio Braxiliense, Bibliex, Rio de Janeiro 1956.

Guimarães, João Neri, Obras Maçonicas de Hipólito José da Costa – Homenagem ao Segundo Centenário de sua Iniciaçao [no prelo da Gráfica e Editora do Grande Oriente do Brasil].

Hamill, J. M., Commentary on the paper by Shaftesley, ibid. pp. 50-51.

Jackson, A. C. F., Commentary on the paper by Shaftesley, ibid. p. 55.

James, P. R., Commentary on p. 145, on the paper "Preston as Preceptor and Ritualist" by Alex Horne, Ars Quatuor Coronatorum, Vol. 81, 1968, pp. 129-142.

Marques, A. H. de Oliveira, História da maçoneria em Portugal – Dos Origens ao Triunfo, Vol. I, Ed. Presença, Lisbon 1990.

Pereira, José Luiz de Moura, Hipólito da Costa – O Patriarca da Imprensa Brasileira, Studio Z, BSB 1996.

Preston, William, Illustrations of Masonry, 11th Edition of 1804 reprinted by The Aquarian Press, Wellingborough, Northamptonshire, 1986.

Rizzini, Carlos – Hipólito da Costa e o Correio Braziliense, Companhia Editora Nacional, São Paulo 1957.

Shaftesley, John M., "Jews in English Freemasonry in the 18th and 19th Centuries",

            Ars Quatuor Coronatorum, Volume 92 for 1979, published November 1980

            pp. 25-45 and 60.

Sobrinho, Barbosa Lima, Hipólito da Costa – Pioneiro da Independencia do Brasil,  Assis Chateaubriand Foundation, BSB 1996.

Waite, Arthur Edward, A New Encyclopaedia of Freemasonry, University Books, New York 1970, Vol. 1, sub voc. Dionysian Artificers, pp. 185-188.

 

Miscellaneous Internet Sites:

1) http://www.biblio.com.br/Templates/HipolitodaCosta/HipolitodaCosta.htm

2) http://www.ponteiro.com.br/mostrad0.php?w=5949. "Pesquisando datas no Ponteiro".

3) http://www.brown.edu/Facilities/John_Carter_Brown_Library/CB?impressao.htm, "Impressão Regia in Rio de Janeiro".

4) http://www.gob.org.br/Default/coletanea_archivos/biografias/Hipolito.htm. Grande Oriente do Brasil, "Pod. Ir. 18 – Hyppolito José da Costa Pereira Furtado de Mendonça".

5) http://www.academia.org.br/imortais/cads/17/hipolito.htm. "Hipólito da Costa, Patrono".

 

Notes

 

[1]    Now named Colonia de Sacramento, this is the oldest town in Uruguay. It is situated on the east side of the River Plate facing Buenos Aires on the other side. The town was ruled alternatively by the Spanish and Portuguese Empires, until the 1777 Treaty of Ildefonso  finally settled the border between the two European powers.

[2]    One of the better known members of the Hurtado de Mendoza family was the Admiral of Castille, Diego Hurtado de Mendoza, whose son Iñigo López de Mendoza, Marquis of Santillana (1398-1458), was a renowned poet; another famous member of the illustrious family was Andrés, Marquis of Cañete (c. 1500-1561), Viceroy of Peru.

[3]    Shaftesley, p. 27. In his paper, Shaftesley mentions an item in the 1898 Ars Quatuor Coronatorum where Ben da Costa, a Past Master of the Friars Lodge and Preceptor of the Israel Lodge of Instruction N° 205, who was undoubtedly a Jew, claimed kinship with Hyppolito da Costa.

[4]    Shaftesley, p. 35.

[5]    Almeida de Carvalho.

[6]    www.ponteiro.com.br, category 5949, Hipólito José da Costa.

[7]    Almeida de Carvalho.

[8]    http://www.gob.org.br/Default/coletanea_arquivos/biografias/Hipolito.htm.

[9]    Costella: Os Biógrafos de Hipólito da Costa

[10]    Almeida de Carvalho.

[11]    Castellani.

[12]    Preston.

[13]    Hamill, and Dawson, who believed that Grand Lodge approved the request.

[14]    Preston, pp. 371-2.

[15]    The Corregidor was an officer of the court in Spain and Portugal who acted as the personal representative of the king.

[16]    Pina Manique was virulent in his hatred of Masonry. In a letter to the Regent, John (who had to take power because of his mother's madness), he claimed that the Masons were declared enemies of all and any religion, but in particular the Christian one, and that in Masonic meetings "an image of crucified Jesus was mocked, manhandled, spit upon and dragged". He also declared that he had a thirst that could be slaked only with the blood of Freemasons  (Castellani).

[17]    Castellani.

[18]    Costella: Cronología pessoal do jornalista.

[19]    The Duke also caused a memorial to Da Costa to be erected in the Church at Hurley near Maidenhead.

[20]    Costella: Cronologia pessoal do jornalista

[21]    Almeida de Carvalho.

[22]    A. C. F. Jackson (see the Bibliography) claims "he was, in fact, the Duke of Sussex's 'Masonic Secretary' and very closely in the Duke's confidence. The Duke had spent some time in Portugal as an exile while the scandal of his morganatic marriage faded away.

[23]    "The Significance of the Provinces for the Masonic Historian", Ars Quatuor Coronatorum, Vol. 112, 1999, note on p. 8.

[24]    Costella: Os Biógrafos de Hipólito da Costa

[25]    The Duke held this position until his death in 1843.

[26]    Almeida de Carvalho.

[27]    Hamill.

[28]    Bible.tmt.com/nki/costa_joseph_da_(Jewish_Encyclopedia).

[29]    James, P. R.

[30]    www.igutenberg.org/biblio21.html

[31]    Alves de Silva.

[32]    Correio Braziliense, Brasília, 9 April 2001.

[33]    Chaparro, p.2.

[34]    Dias de Souza Filho.

[35]    In note 33.5 Da Costa mentions that the Septuagint version always translates Gebbel for Byblos, and Lucian, in his Treatise de Dea Syria, says expressly that Gabala was Byblos, famous for the worship of Adonis.

[36]    Da Costa, pp 35-36.

[37]    Cf. my article "The Dead Sea Scrolls", in the Pietre-Stones web site: www.freemasons-freemasonry.com

[38]    http://www.academia.org.br/academicos/elmano_cardim

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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